Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura

"One of the most innonative game this year... not perfect, but is certainly great."

What I can say? This game is one of the most unique RPGs I've ever played, and it's role playing ascpects are just overwhelming.

Graphics:6/10

This is the most lacking part of the game, the background of the architecture is beautiful, but in the wild it's just gets very repeative, with the same type of plants over and over again, and the character models looks like if they are floating on the ground, and they look kinda ugly too.

Sound:7/10
The classic violin music in Arcanum is very impressive, with very claming and enjoyable, though sometimes it can get a little repeative. The sound affects isn't something that we should brag about, but I have seen a RPG that should.

Gameplay:8/10
The gameplay is one of the most enjoyable ones I've seen in years, the character creation is just purely magnificent,, with so many skills and so little poitn to spend it makes you crazy to think about all the possibilities, not to mention the very interesting background choices. The gameplay world is just HUGE, thre are just dozens of secret location, most of them you can only discover by walking randomly, making this game very realistic, though it's VERY easy to get lost, especially when you don't have the text box of which you can recall past messages and dislogue like the ones in Baldur's Gate. The way-point walking makes walking in big places very easy, all you have to do is go to the map and click on the right spot, and if it's not far enough, the click again to put a route, and so on, and makes travel pretty easy and not boring trying to get from one edge to another. the battle system lacks a little however, the real time battles are jsut uncontrollable, everyone is just moving too fast for you to control them, and trying to select spells is just asking for your ass kicked, since pausing BG-style is not available, the turn based battles are much better, since you can control what your doing and think of your steps. The skills that you can use is just endless, with TONS of ranks spread in dozens of abilities, and the magic-technology meter is just one of the most innonative gameplay additions I've seen in years, who indicates how good you are in magical and technological skills, but you can't be good at the 2 at the same time, sicne they are opposite sides of the coin, when you grow strogner in magical abilities you get weaker in technology, and the opposite also takes affect, this also affects the items you can use, if your very strong at technology you won't be able to get any of the magical powerso of magical items, while technical weapons will almost always fail to the powerful mages, and often also hurts the mage who uses it, giving a great blance to the game. Another good gameplay aspect is the alighment meter, like Planescape:Torment, your alighment changes with your action, thus giving you more and more freedom. a annoying aspect is your followers, that you can't give orders directly, so they usually do lots of stupid stuff thanks to the so-so AI.

Story:8/10
You have gotten a big airship, and suddenly 2 aircrafts blows it down, and strangely your unhurt, and in the ruins of the airship you find a old gnome who asks you to give a ring of his to the ''boy'', who shall know what to do, and in the mists of the gas, you see a robed shadow coming.... that is the begining of the Arcanum, and I won't spoil any other thing. The storyline itself is quite good for a open-ended RPG, and can be very interesting, with lots of plot twists. The good thing is that there are several storylines and endings that you can follow, so you should be able to replay it alot, not just once.

Overall:8/10
This game is great, although it's not perfect, it certainly worths your money and gives a 80+ hours of so of good entertainment with a great deal of replay value.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 05/08/02, Updated 05/08/02